In part II of our series on the Indo Pacific, your resident nerds take on the complex tinderbox of the South China Sea. In this episode, we talk about why the Sea is so hotly contested, why China is hellbent on taking it all for itself, who the relevant state actors are, what exactly is at stake, and whether or not international law can actually help the situation. To access the maps to better understand what we talk about in this episode, check out our website geopoliticsrundown.com.
INTRO
RAMYA:
Hello everyone and welcome back to our podcast! Today, we are doing part II of our series on the Indo Pacific about the South China Sea. It is a topic that everyone has heard of at some point — but is convoluted enough that people are often discouraged to learn more about it.
Let’s start with what has made the news in the past few weeks.
So recently, the United States sent over two US Navy aircraft carriers to the South China Sea — USS Nimitz and USS Ronald Reagan. The US Navy’s statement said that the two carriers “form the most agile fighting force in the world,” and the intent is clear; to make a strong show of power in the South China Sea, in response to years of Chinese misbehavior in the region. On July 5th, the carriers conducted some of the largest military drills in recent history, essentially simulating attacks on enemy bases in the South China Sea. The Chinese navy, referred to as the PLA Navy, was close by to witness.
The drills could be seen as tit for tat for China’s own military drills in early June that had Vietnam and the Philippines up in arms. They could also be seen as an escalation in the already tense situation between China and the US in the South China Sea, and it may be a sign that the situation is reaching a boiling point. Moreover, it’s a microcosm of how power dynamics in the South China Sea have played out so far. So why is this a big deal?
HUNTER:
And this is something we really want to talk about because all we hear in the news year after year is “tensions in the South China Sea” “operations in the South China Sea” you know, “The south china sea dispute”. You’re probably thinking can someone PLEASE give me the full story? And that’s the whole point of our show–to help break down these complex topics in a clear, concise way.
RYAN:
Before we get fully into today’s episode, I’ve got to ask you all to pull up a map of the SCS. We provide multiple maps on our website for you all to utilize, or you could pull up your own, whatever works for you. But we really do think a map will be essential for your understanding of the episode because we’re gonna be talking about places that you probably have never heard of before and can’t immediately place in your mind. Alright with that out of the way, let’s get into it.
BACKGROUND/ WHAT IS THE SOUTH CHINA SEA?
RAMYA:
The South China Sea is a body of water that unites East Asia and Southeast Asia with Oceania. Ten countries surround the sea: Brunei, Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam. These countries, with the exception of China, form a group called ASEAN.
There are over 250 islands, shoals, and reefs and other formations in the South China Sea. But the islands to note for this episode are the Spratly Islands, the Paracel Islands, and briefly, the Scarborough Shoal.
Six out of ten ASEAN countries have claims within the SCS: Vietnam on the West, China and Taiwan in the North, The Philippines on the East, with Malaysia and Brunei towards the South.
HUNTER:
And why is this sea so important?
RYAN:
The SCS is of great geostrategic significance. For starters, about $3.37 trillion worth of international trade passes through it every year, which is about a third of all global maritime trade. It allows 80% of China’s crude oil imports to flow, as well as 40% of global liquefied natural gas trade, and hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue circulate from countries like Japan, South Korea, Germany, Indonesia, and the United States.
Furthermore, the region has enormous amounts of oil and gas. There are about 11 billion barrels of untapped oil and 190 trillion cubic feet of natural gas in the South China sea.
10% of the world’s fisheries can also be found there, making the South China Sea one of the most resource-rich areas of the world that is still up for grabs. For these reasons, the SCS is a hotbed for competing influences amongst world powers great and small.
REASON FOR DISPUTES
HUNTER:
So when we hear about the South China Sea, there is always some mention of “tensions.” What are these disputes all about?
RAMYA:
So we mentioned that, out of the ten ASEAN countries, six have claims within the sea. But the problem is each country has their own idea of how much of the sea they have control over.
So officially under international law — in this case, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea or UNCLOS, each country is allowed what is called an Exclusive Economic Zone, or EEZ. A country can only claim about 12 miles off of its coast as territory, but an EEZ allows the state the right to all resources within a 200 mile zone. Now you might think that this only extends from the mainland coasts, but there’s a loophole. Any islands that are a state’s territory ALSO have a 200 mile EEZ.
This is where China comes in. So what China is doing is claiming islands further and further away from the Chinese Mainland, effectively extending their EEZ far beyond the Chinese coast. And they’ve gone a step further–they have been making artificial islands in the SCS, fortifying them with military bases, and claiming that their EEZ extends from these fake islands.
RYAN:
And China claims nearly the entirety of the sea. China’s reasoning is that, historically, the area they claim was already in China’s possession, based on the 1947 Nine Dash Line that demarcates the area China claims. The nine-dash line is actually based on a map by the Republic of China, otherwise known as Taiwan, which is a large U-shape in the SCS. The nine dash line demonstrates both China’s expansionist mindset and the historical significance of the SCS, and because it dates from before the rise of the PRC, Taiwan also lays claim to the area within the nine dash line.
So China’s huge claim to the sea is causing a lot of political turmoil in the region, but it’s not just China’s claims that are worrying. The actions that China is taking to reinforce its claims are threatening the balance of power in the Indopacific and forcing the hands of many countries from outside the region, most notably the United States.
HUNTER:
I see. So what would you say is China’s goal?
RYAN:
China wants to take control of the sea for all the reasons anyone would, the resources and key location, but there is a higher strategic logic behind the decision. Beijing is trying to create a buffer between its enemies and its highly valuable developments in Southern China, mainly Hainan Island, which houses the Chinese nuclear submarine fleet, and the vital ports and population centers in the Pearl River Delta.
RAMYA:
Really, it’s part of a larger trend we see in Xi Jinping’s aggressive foreign policy since rising to power in 2012, a grand strategy that we have talked about in a number of other episodes. But we also have to take into account China, Xi Jinping, and the CCP’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, which has fundamentally changed politics and foreign policy across the globe.
In this case, it’s not controversial to say that Beijing’s efforts to maintain face by downplaying the seriousness of the pandemic backfired, and has brought China under even more scrutiny than usual. It is entirely possible that this current climate has led the CCP to look for ways to divert both internal and external attention away from COVID and towards matters that either excite or distract the Chinese people, like border skirmishes in Kashmir and, more importantly, efforts to claim the SCS. We see this happen with a number of world leaders who want to gain more approval from their people.
WHAT IS CHINA DOING?
HUNTER:
That’s actually a really good point. So what have they been doing?
RYAN:
Well, in order to protect these areas of strategic interest, China is building military installations on a number of island chains across the SCS, mostly in the Spratly and Paracel islands. In some cases, China is actually building up the islands themselves, adding thousands of acres of land to make room for the infrastructure projects and resupply ships.
HUNTER:
What does China want with the Paracel Islands? Listeners, this is a good time to pull up the map on our website.
RAMYA:
So the Paracel Islands are located near the coast of Vietnam. Because of their location, the Paracel islands form a natural barricade around Hainan island — an island that China is intent on controlling.
While China has 20 outposts among the Paracel islands, the most developed is an island called Woody Island. 1400 people work on the island, consisting of mainly fishermen and some government officials.
On Woody Island, the town of Sansha acts as the administrative capital for all of China’s holdings in the SCS. According to reports, China has installed surface to air missiles and anti-ship missiles, and has even developed hangars for J-11 fighter jets. The reason I’m mentioning this is because Woody Island is a terrific example of what China hopes to achieve on every island they’ve occupied in the SCS — the island is both a military site and a growing center for civilian businesses.
The thing about the Paracel Islands is that they are only disputed by Vietnam and Taiwan — the Spratlys, on the other hand, are claimed in various portions by all six claimants of the SCS.
HUNTER:
Interesting. Let’s do a quick recap of all six claimants, which you can see in the maps we have provided — clockwise from the North, there is China, Taiwan, Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei and Vietnam.
So let’s talk about the Spratly Islands. What has China been upto there? What is China’s deal with the Spratly Islands?
RYAN:
In the Spratlys, China has actually added 3,200 acres worth of land to the reefs in an effort to create more space for airfields, deepwater ports, and other military installations.
The three most prominent reefs, Mischief, Subi, and Fiery Cross, have been fully outfitted for military use, including hangers for 24 fighter jets and 4 larger planes suitable for surveillance, resupply or bombing runs, as well as mobile missile launchpads.
Let’s compare the Paracels with the Spratlys. The Paracel Islands are in a defensive location near Hainan Island. But the Spratly Islands are located in the middle of the South China Sea — they are perfect for the purpose of an offensive outpost. Under China’s control, those reefs effectively become multiple aircraft carriers permanently positioned in range of every other claimant.
HUNTER:
It sounds like these islands are of huge military significance.
RYAN:
Absolutely. In fact, there might be a bigger, unreached goal that China is working to accomplish — that would be an Air Defense Identification Zone, or an ADIZ, over the South China Sea. The vast amount of hanger space on the Spratly and Paracel islands, as well as surface-to-air installations, leads us to make this assumption.
HUNTER:
And what exactly is an ADIZ?
RAMYA:
So an ADIZ is an area of land or sea that a country claims and is willing to inspect all aircraft that fly through it. That means all aircraft need to verify their trajectory, purpose, etc. to, in this case, Chinese authorities every time they fly through. Any aircraft that is deemed suspicious may be harassed and potentially shot down. It’s not an act that will be formally recognized by other countries, particularly the US, but Beijing’s aim is to demonstrate its control and current authority over the SCS.
RYAN:
China would maintain an ADIZ by using the fighter jets and surface to air missile systems stationed in the Spratly and Paracel islands to control the airspace over the SCS. To protect the installations, China uses its navy, air force, coast guard, and maritime militias to harass other countries’ commercial and military vessels.
In fact, the Chinese navy is the largest naval force in the SCS, and its coast guard and maritime militias frequently use commercial fishing boats as a disguise to harass other unwary ships in the area. One such Vietnamese ship was sunk by Chinese coast guard ships on April 3rd this year, a clear demonstration of Beijing’s intent to firmly control the entirety of the SCS.
HUNTER:
So China is building up these reefs and shoals into full blown islands to fit Beijing’s strategic goals. But we’ve only focused on the military side of things.
RYAN:
True, and there’s far more to it. Economically, China has a lot to gain, as we mentioned earlier. Securing the vast amounts of oil and natural gas in the SCS would go a long way towards fueling the massive Chinese economy. Using EEZs, China is wrestling control of these islands away from the other claimant countries. Basically, China has been turning reefs, rocks, and low tide elevations in the Paracel and Spratly islands into full fledged islands so that Beijing can begin accruing the tens of millions of barrels of oil and natural gas, not to mention controlling the fisheries in the SCS.
RAMYA:
By making the Paracel and Spratly islands an economic issue as well as a military one, China is diversifying its claims to the SCS in an effort to normalize its control over the area.
To that end, Beijing has been taking overt and official actions recently to strengthen its economic claims in the form of two administrative districts in the Spratly and Paracel Islands.
We mentioned the town of Sansha earlier, which is located on Woody Island. As of April 2020, the two island chains are officially governed by this administrative capital. This achieves basically nothing of substance, but it’s a symbolic gesture that demonstrates to the rest of the world that China has total control over these islands and who they belong to is not up for debate. And no one in the region can stop them alone.
HUNTER:
I think it’s safe to say that other countries are quite pissed off with China. What are they doing about this situation?
RYAN:
Well understandably the rest of the world is not happy about this. XJP promised the US that it would not militarize the region in 2015, and then did so anyway. All actions by the PLA Navy since then have been enormously provocative and have made China’s neighbors nervous, especially Vietnam, Malaysia, and the Philippines.
Vietnam is the only other country that claims the Paracel Islands, in addition to Taiwan of course, so it is especially threatened by China’s control over them. That’s because the Paracel Islands’ missile and aircraft capabilities could soon be able to threaten Vietnamese shores.
To combat this threat, Vietnam has built up its military capabilities more than any other claimant besides China. The buildup involves reinforcing its own EEZ with A2AD systems, submarines, and coastal defense missile systems, and even its own fishing boat militia to rival China’s. The improvements have made Vietnam a thorn in China’s side –we mentioned earlier that China’s coast guard sank a Vietnamese fishing boat near the Paracel Islands. That boat may very well have been a part of the Vietnamese maritime militia, but no official statements have been made by either side.
RAMYA:
Similar to Vietnam, Malaysia has also built up its military in response to China. This is because China claims the James and South Luconia Shoals in the Spratly Islands — we have provided a map for you on the website. The Malaysian navy and coast guard are expanding, with new coastal combat and patrol vessels. However, budget cuts are hampering the modernization of Malaysia’s aging airforce.
In many ways, Malaysia’s military buildup pales in comparison to Vietnam’s, but the Philippines is even worse off than Malaysia. Diplomatically, dictator Rodrigo Duterte has distanced his country from its longtime ally the United States. Duterte announced on June 2, 2020 that he would scrap the bilateral Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) which provides legal status for US troop involvement in the Philippines and provides the basis for all joint exercises and operations conducted by the two countries. Duterte stated that his country’s relationship with the US was making it a target for Chinese aggression, as evidenced by China’s seizure of the Filipino-claimed Scarborough Shoal in 2012 and President Obama’s refusal to offer military support to reclaim it. Whatever the reason, the absence of the US has left Duterte painfully alone.
HUNTER:
And what of the Philippines military?
RYAN:
Militarily, Manila has made many promises on its initiative to modernize its outdated navy, but very little has come of it so far, making the Filipino navy one of the weakest in the region. As well, the Filipino air force currently has very few combat capable aircraft with which to fight for air superiority. Although, Manila has been more successful with its coast guard, thanks to funding from Japan for new vessels. So without strong friends or a strong military, the Philippines is a prime target for China to move on first.
However, the Philippines may have made one of the largest contributions towards curtailing China’s efforts in the SCS. After Beijing claimed the disputed Scarborough Shoal in 2012, Manila brought them to court in the Hague over the status of China’s holdings in the Spratly Islands.
By 2016, the tribunal decided that those Chinese holdings are not legally islands, but low tide elevations, rocks, and reefs. That means that legally they do not produce an EEZ and therefore China is not entitled to the resources located there. However, Beijing has disputed the ruling and declared their holdings are islands and must be treated as such.
HUNTER:
Can China really just ignore a ruling from one of the highest courts in the world with no repercussions?
RAMYA:
I wouldn’t say that there have been no repercussions, since it has led to the situation escalating to its present form, but essentially the answer is yes. There is no enforcing principle behind international courts beyond what countries are willing to do, and no one is willing to try.
HUNTER:
But what about the United States? We’ve discussed a little of what Washington has been up to in the SCS regarding the recent aircraft carrier drills, but is that the extent of it?
RYAN:
To understand the US’s actions in the SCS, you first need to understand what the legal term “Freedom of Navigation” means. It’s a right codified in UNCLOS that basically states any country’s vessels, commercial or military, are free to maneuver through any and all waters as long as they don’t conduct any military, research, or commercial operations along the way.
The United States hasn’t ratified UNCLOS, but uses its navy to staunchly enforce Freedom of Navigation. That way, the US can enforce a rule that benefits it while also allowing the room to violate it in the future if need be. If that sounds strange or even unfair to you, it just goes to show that in geopolitics, the stronger you are, the less beholden you are to the rules.
RAMYA:
Because of how strategically important the South China Sea is to the United States and more importantly, to its allies such as Japan and South Korea, the US Navy conducts freedom of navigation operations, or FONOPS. As China has become more aggressive in the region, the extent of these operations has increased in an effort to oppose Chinese influence.
We’ve provided two maps to help illustrate how these work, but there’s two things you need to know about how the US conducts these FONOPS: how they’re supposed to be conducted and how they’re actually conducted.
US ships are supposed to move in a straight line through foreign waters as fast as possible.
But what they’re actually doing in the SCS is moving in a zig zag, taking their time, then conducting some sort of drill, and then heading out of what China claims as its EEZ. The US does this to demonstrate to China that they don’t respect China’s EEZ claims and can do whatever they want in the SCS.
HUNTER:
So both the US and China seem to do whatever they want or need to do to get their points across. China wants people to respect their claims and break the rules to enforce it, while the US bends the rules of FONOPS to demonstrate that they disagree. Great powers really do get to write their own rules.
RYAN:
Exactly, and that brings back to something we talked about in the last episode called realism, which is the idea that all state actions are fundamentally about power. And that same problem lies at the heart of the South China Sea issue. There is a disconnect between China’s actions and what’s allowed under international law, but what separates International law from domestic law is that there’s no way to enforce it.
Things like Freedom of Navigation, Exclusive Economic Zones, are codified as law but are in effect just norms of behavior. In the real world, powerful countries can break or bend international law to their liking. We just mentioned China ignoring the Hague’s ruling on the Scarborough Shoal, and the US not ratifying a law it enforces, because all it really comes down to is no one is willing to call them on it.
RAMYA:
If you’ve ever heard that the USA is “the world’s policeman”, this is why. Right now, the US Navy is the only force strong enough to ensure freedom of navigation in the South China Sea, and so the US feels compelled to push China on this issue, since its regional allies are not strong enough to do it themselves. And there’s a power component too–the resources in the SCS would give China an advantage that the US cannot allow.
Final Takes
RYAN:
The SCS is a nuanced situation with so many different actors involved that it’s hard to keep track of it all. China has laid claims to almost the entirety of it, and is enforcing its claims by building military installations on islands, reefs, and low tide elevations in the area. Despite international backlash, including being taken to court by the Philippines, China has not backed down on its efforts to control the key waterways. Countries like Vietnam, Malaysia, and the Philippines have tried on their own to deter China, but US presence in the form of FONOPS is necessary to stop China’s incursion in other parts of the SCS.
RAMYA:
The SCS is a preeminent example of geopolitics in the world. The geography of the area creates a situation where the rising power, China, claims a massive amount of territory that overlaps with the claims made by a multitude of smaller states. This is because there are countless valuable resources in the SCS — natural gas, oil and vast fisheries are all up for grabs. Also, the SCS is essentially bordered by 10 countries, and therefore, this current situation is an almost perfect example of a geopolitical flashpoint. And with flashpoints come the strong countries, like China and the US, bending the rules to suit their own needs. Whether it’s China denying the Hague’s ruling on the Spratly Islands, or the US using the freedom of navigation to conduct drills wherever it wants, actions like these are at the center of great power conflicts throughout history. The South China Sea is a flashpoint with the potential to be where the US and China’s conflict is decided.
OUTRO
That’s it for our show today. If you enjoyed the show please rate subscribe. Stay tuned next week for our first interview with our friend Michael Hilliard from the red line podcast, where we’ll explore how australia fits into the power politics of the indo pacific. As always thank you for listening, this has been Geopolitics…Rundown
Interesting information of SCS + MAPS for better understand about GEOPOLITICS.